Guns on the rack. Courtesy photo.

In 1993, in response to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention-funded study that reported guns in the home were associated with increased risk of homicide in the home, the National Rifle Association lobbied Congress, which thereafter dutifully passed the Dickey Amendment in 1996. That amendment mandates that "none of the funds made available for injury prevention and control at the CDC may be used to advocate or promote gun control."

As a result, the CDC got the message that if you fund research that angers the gun lobby, there will be consequences, i.e., the risk of substantial cuts to your budget. In actuality, the lack of funding is due less to the Dickey Amendment itself than to its implications. In other words, pursue research on hot-button questions about guns and face the wrath of lawmakers who control the agency's funding.

Nevertheless, without federal funding, there are no training grants to fund doctoral students and postdocs in gun-policy research like there are in other fields of injury prevention and public policy. As a consequence, there are too few dedicated gun-policy researchers in the country. Additionally, the National Institutes of Health offers no K awards (which provide significant career development funding for early career researchers) in the field of gun violence prevention. Furthermore, the federal government hampers the collection and distribution of data, including the incidence of nonlethal shootings that could significantly enhance the understanding of gun violence. Scientists complain that we have more and more people dying and experiencing injuries from gun violence every year, and we're still having problems getting basic research done because we can't get the data or the funding. The CDC's willingness to look at noncontroversial activities such as the effect of mediating disputes between gangs is fine, but a broader look at interventions or other kinds of solutions to the problem would certainly be better.

After the Parkland, Florida, shooting that left 17 dead, government officials remarked on the lack of research funding. Alex Azar, the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, said his understanding was that the Dickey Amendment "does not in any way impede our ability to conduct our research mission. It is simply about advocacy." He agreed to instruct the agencies he leads to do gun research, stating: "We're in the science business and the evidence-generating business, and so I will have our agency certainly be working in this field." Language in the March 2018 government spending bill highlighted his remarks: "While appropriations language prohibits the CDC and other agencies from using appropriated funding to advocate or promote gun control, the Secretary of Health and Human Services has stated the CDC has the authority to conduct research on the causes of gun violence."

The Democrats wrote that part of the government spending bill in order to reverse the Dickey Amendment. While the amendment itself remains, the language in a report accompanying the spending bill clarifies that the CDC can indeed conduct research into gun violence, but cannot use government-appropriated funds to specifically advocate for gun control. It was signed into law by President Donald Trump on March 23, 2018.

But this language does not go far enough. In fact, rather than freeing up the CDC to fund more research on gun violence, this new language is read by some to do the opposite, by seeming to limit CDC funding to examining the "causes" of gun violence. Researchers can now theoretically, and as an academic exercise, count dead people but not determine how to prevent preventable deaths. At this point, multiple deaths later, it's time to not focus on what the intent of that budget language was. It's time to repeal the Dickey Amendment and make research more permissible for public health agencies to fund firearms research. Efforts to suppress gun research have resulted in more lives lost. Applying science to other public health issues such as motor vehicle deaths and smoking saved lives without banning cars and cigarettes.